Understanding Soul

If we strive for our one singular passion with the assumption that once achieved, we’ll be ultimately fulfilled, chances are we will sadly be disillusioned when we finally reach it – for it’s not the single attainment of the goal that satisfies, but surprisingly the journey, the people, the lessons, and the little joys that fulfill while we’re yet striving, and hopefully appreciating life around us and the loved ones we haven’t taken for granted that rewards us the most when we accomplish our dreams, as the happiness of the dream is not solely the dream, but rather the journey, struggles and obstacles overcame that usher the bliss.

The Writer’s Voice

Writers are born, I believe.  Before the writer knows they’ll become a writer, circumstances and events pull them to the craft with a serious, fascinating devotion that disturbs comfort when muse or inspiration suddenly strikes.

The stages of this craft can be more challenging than the craft itself – discovery, profession, commitment, sacrifice, and that daunting urgency to find ones voice, which can make a novice anxious at the idea of their voice being estranged before unearthed.

Yet, the writing voice is not a mysterious expedition.  It is [you] – the person you are … the voice and the words within, which feel natural coming out of your mouth.

It’s an organic discovery that allows writers to fearlessly express themselves and master the choreography of their voice without losing themselves in the intended message of the dance.

There's nothing more important to say at this time than VOTE.

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“The secret and the sacred are sisters. When the secret is not respected, the sacred vanishes.”

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             – John O’Donohue

The Channsin Berry One-Question Interview

All images Courtesy of D. Channsin Berry

In 2011, film directors, D. Channsin Berry and Bill Duke produced Dark Girls, a documentary-confessional unveiling the painful stories on Colorism among African Americans, which later premiered to millions of viewers on the Oprah Winfrey Network.

Continuing the dialog on this discriminatory practice that still exists across all stages of life, Channsin Berry takes the lead, examining the subject again in Dark Girls 2 and shares his most emotional moment while filming this documentary after seeking divine intervention to create the setting for his youngest participants to disclose the psychological trauma from colorism in part 2 of this OWN Spotlight feature. 

 

Interiors of Man: One of the most touching scenes from Dark Girls 2 was your filming the testimonies of high school girls sharing their painful experiences of being victimized for their dark skin, and capturing the reaction of a fair skinned girl appearing not to have realized the gravity of their pain until turning around and seeing others crying beside her, and then, it hit her.

It was a moment of healing and humanity and [that’s] where it all begins – the moment when light and dark can empathize with each other’s painful experiences with Colorism.

D. Channsin Berry: When I asked a teacher friend of mine, Fluker, and the assistant principal to put together a group of African-American girls to talk about Colorism at El Camino Real Charter High School, I expected no more than five to ten girls and when I got there the assistant principal said there will be twenty-eight to thirty girls participating, and after we, (my crew and I), set up, the girls started trickling in until there were thirty-one girls packed in there and it threw me off.  I said how I’m going to deal with this?  So I prayed on it and when I went back in, it was quiet as a church, and we talked, (off camera), about Black people – girls, boys, men, women … our history.

Then, I asked the question, and after the first hand went up it was all over and they decided to talk.  [That] scene is the hardest scene for me to watch that I walked out of the screening for that scene with OWN.  It took everything within me to take in all the emotion, trauma, and pain from those babies.  When they started showing their emotions, it was nothing but God and a full-on healing session.  It wore me and the crew out – a 95% White crew oppose to my usual 95-98% Black crew with 55% being women of color.  Not this time, this time I worked with a few phenomenal friends and technicians who were White and whom I trusted, and that day, with those babies, my White crew was done.  The teacher and the co-principal were also done.  There wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

Afterwards, girls who never associated with each other were hugging and exchanging numbers … and I ask myself what would’ve happened if that segment never took place?

God showed up for me on this project long ago before I got to this planet, and I have dedicated my life to films of healing for us and to educate others.

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For more on this segment and Dark Girls 2, search and visit  OWN

“The power of faith is transformative.  It can be utilized in your own personal life to change your individual condition …”                                                                        

                                                                                                       – John Lewis

Links to Excellence – Omar’s Blues

What if the young people we have seen rioting, looting, and unleashing destructive anger during the most global protest in history, rechannel their passion by taking a serious assessment of their innate talents and given the needed resources to cultivate the best expression of themselves in alignment with their purpose?  Instead of prejudging them on surface as another cultural assumption, we would see the manifestation of an  Omar Gordon.

        “A lie that is half-truth is the darkest of all lies.”

                                                                       ― Alfred Tennyson
                                                                            

    

Before Corona

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic a fleeting thought went through my mind in regards to the massive resources, wealth, and possibilities we as Americans are privileged to, and the orchestrated logistics that enable us to walk into a store and freely shop for essentials and non-essentials  without struggle – a privilege most of us took for granted until now.

I believe this subconscious thought was planted after watching a documentary on the scarcity of water in African nations, which some have risked their lives to obtain.

Inverse to this, was an episodic observation on #blackAF, which I believe was intended to make an insightful point, oppose to humor, as a comedic character was amazed that there were plenty bottles of imported water for everyone to drink at a lavish cookout – this, again, speaking to America’s privilege, wealth and the possibilities for wealth, as the show depicts an affluent family privy to any material desire, which again, some take for granted or fail to appreciate.

Now being forced to prioritize our needs, scale back, and see that having less brings gratitude, I hope we will learn that abundance doesn’t come with satisfaction and more is not needed to be content.

Links to Excellence – And Still I Rise

Courtesy of Bob Hercules and Media Process Group

Film Trailer

This PBS documentary on the late Maya Angelou is Interiors’ selection for women’s history month, given its inspiring title and mantra that exemplified the strength of Angelou and many powerful women that we have or have had in our lives, who would encourage us in these difficulty times.

Currently streaming on Netflix, the following link provides a behind-the-scenes discussion of the film with its Peabody Award-winning Directors, Bob Hercules and Rita Coburn-Whack.

American Masters Behind-the-Scenes Interview

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For more information, visit The Maya Angelou Film

and Media Process Group

Commercialized Love

The images of interracial relationships often seen in today’s media, and real life, usually consist of a black man with a woman of another race when the interracial component involves a person of color.

Some argue that this dynamic speaks to America’s racial progress since the Antebellum South, Jim Crow and the tragic death of Emmett Till – times when the lives of African Americans were at risk for even thinking of the forbidden and accused of such. The truth in this argument validates itself, bearing historical consequences that bred fear, which is now replaced by male-liberation and possibly victorious-pride to defy a system that was so punitive to the extent of dictating whom one could and could not love.

Even the dictates over the longevity of black love during slavery, and the prices paid after families were separated for financial gain, carried over as forbidden remnants during the early TV era when images of black love were not seen, nor authenticated in the media. 

Quality films and their memorable scores like Love Story, and The Way We Were, had no counter-equivalents aside from rare gems as, Lady Sings the Blues­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­, and Mahogany, whose protagonists' conflict added richness to these stories and their mainstream counterparts. 

After Lady and Mahogany, there was a wide disparity in black love dramas with a rich undertone, till such films as, DuVernay’s, Middle of Nowhere, Jenkins’ Beale Street adaptation,  and currently, The Photograph by producer Will Packer who’s among today’s leading creatives elevating the “black love” genre.

The task to bring these stories to the cultural landscape amid disproportionate images of black-male “interracialization” is imperative, as it offers balance and reminds us that black love does exists and is a sustainable option as any other love.

“Excellence is never an accident.  It is always the result of high intention, sincere effort, and intelligent execution …”                                                             

                                                                                                                   – Aristotle